All posts tagged ‘Core Dump’

Time for one more Core Dump before the end of the year. In this edition, I’ve got a match-three game with a story, a remake of a classic martial arts fighting game, fun with typos, and more! Oh, and one healthy serving of cooperative chaos. Which ones are worth spending your iTunes gift cards on? Keep reading to find out! Continue Reading “Core Dump: Year-End Goodies” »

Core Dump isn’t all fun and games … just mostly. It turns out you can use your iPads and iPhones for some serious things, too. Here are a handful of apps you may find useful, if you can stop playing Avengers Initiative long enough. Continue Reading “Core Dump: It’s Not All Fun & Games” »

Looking for some more games to tide you over during holiday travels? Here are several that I’ve enjoyed recently. Smash things as the Hulk, go on a flower-picking adventure, or press your luck with a classic board game — here’s a little bit of everything. Continue Reading “Core Dump: Tilt, Swipe, Grab, Fling!” »

It’s time for another Core Dump! This one’s a very mixed batch — a platformer, a racer, some real-time strategy games, a maze app for kids, a hidden object game that’s not for kids, and word puzzles. So if you like iOS apps, there’s probably something here for you.

Halloween’s over, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still have some fun with monsters. The story behind this platformer’s a bit weird — something about a kid who finally completed his Monster Crew cards collection only to have them sold to some creepy dude in a castle, and then he turns into Frank of the Monster Crew … Like I said, strange. But the gameplay is simple: tap anywhere to jump, and tap again to stomp down. You’ll traverse floor after floor filled with spiders, skeletons, and ghosts, trying to stomp the ones you can and avoid the ones you can’t. As you play, you’ll collect “cards” which give you bonuses — you can play a single card after each completed floor, helping you to get further or gain coins to buy more cards for your deck.

The gameplay isn’t spectacular, but my kids and I are having fun trying to build up the deck. There is a storyline that you follow, and as you complete missions you get bits of the story revealed to you. Some of the items in the Bonus Store seem ridiculously overpriced, because they’re clearly wanting you to spend some real cash on the in-app currency, but you can play quite a ways into the game without spending a dime. Not quite as great as, say, Jetpack Joyride, but a fun diversion.

Righteous Kill is another crime detective hidden object game, somewhat like Masters of Mystery: Crime of Fashion. You’re a detective searching for clues to solve a series of murders. It’s loosely based on a 2008 movie starring De Niro and Pacino, but in the game you’re a female detective and there isn’t any sign of Turk and Rooster. Parts of the game are typical hidden-object searching, but you also have things like searching for fingerprints and laying out evidence. (This last part, though, is a bit too easy, because there aren’t many clues that fit in multiple spots.) Because of the subject matter, this one’s not for kids, although it’s still fairly tame for adult fare.

Here’s another game from the Kieffer Bros. who created Aqueduct, but this time they’ve got a word puzzle game. It’s sort of a hybrid between Boggle and match-three games, with tiles disappearing and dropping down. However, as you play through the game, more and more special tiles start to appear: bombs which have to be cleared within five moves, spinners that display a different letter after each turn, lock plates that must be used several times to clear, and so on. Each level also has one main objective to clear it, plus three achievements that can earn you stars. I got past most of the levels without too much trouble, but I still haven’t managed to get all the stars yet — it can get pretty tough. As with the Kieffer Bros.’ other apps, the graphics and sound are nicely done. The puzzle menu is made to look like a path through a floating world, which was unexpected but a nice touch. The only downside is that the letters do seem to be totally random, which means that sometimes you’ll get huge runs of the same letter or sections of the board with no vowels whatsoever, but it’s a big enough board that you can sometimes work a different section until things change.

This one’s somewhat bizarre, but can be fun to play with multiple players on a single iPad. In fact, you may need multiple players for some of these puzzles. Finger Tied is a sort of touch maze: you have to color in the provided shape from start point to finish without lifting your finger, retracing your path, or going outside the shape. Simple so far, right? Where it gets tricky is when you have multiple paths to trace, because you can’t start until you’re touching all of the start positions, and you can’t lift any fingers until you reach all of the end positions. Some levels will feel like you’re playing Twister with your fingers. I recruited my kids to help with some of the three- and four-finger mazes, but even then they were a challenge.

Tangled fingers aside, some of the puzzles are tricky just to figure out the paths — there are squares that must be moved through in a particular direction, squares that must be connected to a particular start or end path, and so on. On top of that, you’ll earn a bronze, silver, or gold star depending on your speed in completing the puzzle. Even on Easy (the second of four levels) I’ve had trouble getting gold stars in everything without help. (Note: be sure to turn off multitasking gestures in Settings, or you won’t be able to play any of the four-finger puzzles!)

Robot Race is about, well, racing robots. You get to choose from a number of different bots — two are available at start, and the rest you can unlock by earning (or buying) in-app currency. Each bot also has three different skins you can purchase. But first you’ll need to win some races, and then you’ll want to spend money on the various weapons. As you race, you can pick up powerups that will boost you or slow down your enemies, and what’s inside the powerups depends on which weapons you’ve unlocked in the store. There are six different tracks to race, each with their own obstacles and hidden shortcuts. You can either use tilt controls or touch-screen, although even with tilt you’ll need to tap to activate powers, brake, and jump. It’s not the best racing game I’ve ever played (it’s certainly no F1 Race Stars), but it’s kind of fun and has some humorous elements to it. Plus, it’s only a buck.

Totem Tribe Gold was originally a PC game that’s been ported to iOS, and I’ve gotten totally sucked into it. It’s been responsible for several late nights, so don’t say I didn’t warn you. Aruku, chief of the Hawk tribe, is that woman in the leopard print bikini, and life for her island-dwelling people has gotten dangerous and strange. You help explore the islands, searching for the source of the disruptions. Totem Tribe Gold is a real-time strategy game: your people can build different huts and buildings, which in turn produce specific types of people (workers, hunters, fighters, witch doctors) or can help you research better technology and magic. In the meantime, you can send your Scouts around the island to explore — there’s a “fog of war” effect that hides most of the map until you’ve traveled there, so you don’t always know where the bad guys are hiding until you come across them … or when they come to you.

There are also puzzle elements to the game, and a hidden object feature as you look for little gems and other things scattered around the islands. (Again, though: why don’t hidden-object games include a zoom feature for iOS? Even on the iPad those gems are tiny.) I’ve played it for literally hours, and am finally nearing the end. But I’ll be a little sad when I’m finished, too. You can finish the main story in maybe about half that time, but there are side quests (“interludes”) that open up when you fulfill certain requirements, and if you’re trying to collect all the hidden objects you’ll revisit the islands a lot.

The controls for the game are pretty straightforward and the first few levels are all about teaching you how things work. Once you have the basics, new buildings and people are introduced gradually, so by the time you reach the final levels you’ll have harder decisions about what to build first and which technologies to pursue. Aside from the zoom feature, the one other thing I wish the game had was reminders about what side missions are present on each island on the map screen. I found myself quite often visiting an island to remember which one it was, and then having to wait while it saved and took me back to the map again. But these are mostly minor issues, and overall I had a lot of fun playing Totem Tribe Gold.

Here’s another real-time strategy game, though it’s a bit more frantic than Totem Tribe. Fantasy Conflict pits you (King Flabbian) against the dwarves, who have stolen the Energizer Crystal from your clock so that you overslept and missed breakfast. Whatever the cause, you’re now at war with them so you’re battling for territory across several different regions. Each level has a series of castles with roads leading to and from them. You and the enemy each start with one or more of the castles, and your goal is to take over all of the castles.

Any castle you hold will slowly increase its population up to its max. You can then send either half or all of those soldiers to a connected castle, where they will fight to take it over (or just lump in if it’s already yours). You can also use soldiers to help build up a castle: increasing the size will raise the maximum population; building fortifications makes it costlier for your opponent to attack; building a cannon or crossbow will allow you to shoot down attacking soldiers or airships.

In the meantime, you’ll also get some abilities that will charge up during play, letting you set fire to castles, call in extra troops, inflict a castle with plague, and so on. But watch out — the enemy will have a set of spells to use against you, too. The storyline and graphics are made to be pretty silly, and the game has one of the funniest achievement displays I’ve seen: it’s that portrait of the fat king with his three fighters: as you earn achievements, they get new pieces of their outfits and accessories. It’s another pretty fun game, though it would be cool to be able to play this against other humans and not just the AI opponent.

Finally, one for the kids. My kids like mazes, and Maze Adventures generates new mazes each time you play. With four difficulty levels, there are mazes easy enough for toddlers (maybe too easy) and more challenging ones for older kids. (Though it probably maxes out at tweens — the maze in the lower left is from the highest difficulty level.) You get to choose one of six characters, which changes the sorts of things that will appear in the maze, as well as the look of it. In each maze, you can just try to get to the exit if you like, but you’ll get achievements for collecting all of the goodies and defeating all of the enemies (you’ll need your weapon first) before exiting.

One nice touch is that pretty much all of the instructions are spoken, so non-readers can still play their mazes. My only complaint is the way you can press and hold a certain location to have the character automatically take the shortest path there. It only works up to a certain distance, but on the easier levels you can almost just press and hold the exit and wait for the computer to figure out the maze, defeating the purpose.

Whoa, October is here already? Scratch that, October is almost over already. I guess I should get to work on my kids’ costumes — my younger daughter has decided that this year she’s going to be a banana with a mustache, and my older one has decided she wants to be a vampire angel, whatever that means. But for now, I’ve got a handful of iOS apps — mostly treats — that you may enjoy.

So, you’ve probably noticed that all of these games have something in common: they’ve all got that little “G5″ branding on them. Not only that, but all of these are HOGs: Hidden Object Games. I don’t know what it is about HOGs that appeals to me so much. Maybe it’s nostalgia from Highlights magazine and Where’s Waldo (who, incidentally, celebrated his 25th birthday just recently), but there’s something satisfying and zen-like about looking at a scene and finding the objects hidden within.

I’ve mentioned a few HOGs in the past — my kids and I both enjoy playing them — but lately I’ve played through a bunch of them for the iPad and thought I’d group them together. It’s interesting to me that in nearly all of them in which you’re playing a character, it’s a female; I’m sure that has to do with the demographics of HOG players. In this set, the two Magician’s Handbook games don’t really have a specific character that you’re playing, but in all the others you’re a woman. One of the rare exceptions that I’ve played was Sinister City — but even in that case it’s sort of a romance story anyway.

Some are more straightforward object-hunting, and some use a little bit of object-hunting but involve a lot more story elements. The one feature that I wish were present was a zoom feature. Some objects are easier to find than others, but even on an iPad I’ve found that some things just don’t show up well enough to be found.

Also note: most of these games have an iPhone version and an iPad version. I’d recommend the iPad version simply because it’s hard enough finding things on a big screen; I can’t imagine trying to play a HOG on a smaller screen.

This edition of Core Dump comes to you from far, far away … Taiwan! I’m traveling with my two daughters and I’m finding out whether an iPad is sufficient for international travel. Unfortunately, my iPad 2 doesn’t give me Internet access without wifi, and I’m finding that free public wifi is harder to find in Taipei than I expected. Good thing my dad brought his laptop so I can still check my email more regularly. Here are a handful of apps I’d been playing mostly before my trip; for my next column maybe I’ll tell you about what’s been occupying my time overseas. In the meantime, if you’ve been waiting for me to take my turn in Ascension or Carcassonne, you may just have to wait until I get back.

In this edition, I’ve got some hits and misses: some that look great but aren’t much fun, some that are really addicting, and some in between.

Although the title of this app is Fishing Joy 2, you’re not really fishing — you’re actually shooting fish. With guns. Every shot you take costs you coins, and every time you kill a fish, you get coins; bigger guns cost more coins to fire, and bigger fish reward you with more coins. However, it’s a bit like a slot machine: just because you hit a fish doesn’t mean you’ll kill it. The game is gorgeous and I like the way the fish swim, particularly the way schools of small fish dart away when they’ve been shot at. But it ultimately feels like a big money sink: either you wait to get more coins every 2 to 4 hours, or you pay actual money to shoot fake guns at fake fish.

My kids think it’s great fun to watch, but I’m to sure I’ll let them play unless I’m absolutely sure they’re not going to end up maxing out my credit card to shoot the hammerhead shark. Will you like it? I guess it depends on whether you feel shooting fish is its own reward.

Summoner Wars screenshots: game in progress, game creation screen, deck building screen

Summoner Wars – free single player, must purchase for additional factions and multiplayer

I mentioned Summoner Wars back when I was writing about another turn-based tactical combat app, Hero Academy (which I’m still enjoying). There’s been some debate about whether Hero Academy is a rip-off of Summoner Wars, but in my opinion while there are some similarities, they’re ultimately not the same game and I’ll gladly play both.

For more about Summoner Wars you can read my review of the physical game; the app version is nice overall with a few caveats. You can get the base app for free and play against the AI, but you’ll need to spend some money on faction decks in order to play multiplayer against your pals — which is the whole point, I think. Also, the app tends to be a little twitchy: there have been lots of times when I (or my opponent) have unintentionally made a wrong move because we were trying to do something else — activating the Summoner’s special power when we were just trying to read the card (or perform a regular attack). I’ve gotten used to the “undo” move in Hero Academy, which I understand you wouldn’t want for the die-based attacks, but sometimes Summoner Wars seems a little too unforgiving.

The app currently has factions from the original version of the card game, so those (like me) who have the newer Master Set will need to learn some new factions. The graphics and cards are faithfully reproduced — down to the typos — and most fans of the game will probably enjoy having the app for online play. If you’re expecting to play against friends, most likely you’ll want to get the $7.99 combo that gives you several factions — I’m sure there will be more factions coming later.

From the makers of Putt Putt and Freddi Fish comes this spoof of James Bond. You play as Spy Fox, who is investigating a fiendish plot to replace all cow-based dairy products with — shudder — goat’s milk! There are a lot of allusions to Bond (or perhaps a better comparison may be with Get Smart) but also some that your kids might not get, like the ship captain who talks like a Shatner-era Captain Kirk.

The app is a point-and-click puzzle adventure with a lot of humor and some animated cut scenes. Some of the problems can be a little challenging (solutions weren’t always as apparent as in Putt Putt) but my kids have really been enjoying it nonetheless.

Here’s another one for tower defense fans. Total Defense 3D has you installing gun turrets, missile towers, etc. to prevent the enemy’s vehicles from attacking your base. Your base has a wall which the enemies will attack, and once the wall is gone, then they can start entering your base. Completing levels gives you skill points to upgrade your towers, giving you more firepower or longer range. Also, as towers defeat enemies, they’ll gain experience and can be upgraded.

The “3D” comes in with the way the app zooms in and out: you still use pinch/zoom gestures, but instead of simply enlarging and shrinking the view, the app moves from an overhead view to a nearly ground-level view, and you can rotate the world to see things from a different angle. It’s kind of a neat way to look at things, but it also makes it easy to tap the wrong thing when you’re seeing everything at an angle.

There’s one planet you can play for free, or pay to unlock additional planets, but once you have a lot of upgrades it’s no longer quite as interesting. I was hoping there would be some more missions that had particular goals like destroying an enemy base while protecting your own, but it’s pretty much just like the title says: defense.

Nightfall is a horror-themed deck-building game that has a cool mechanic, though I simply haven’t played it as much because I prefer Thunderstone. Still, folks who like Nightfall praise its fast pace and the fact that you get to directly attack other players.

The app version will let you play against opponents from around the world, but it helps to know the game already. The tutorial’s text and animation aren’t synched up properly, which makes it quite confusing, and unlike Ascensionthere’s no “log” to check what the other players did on their turns. Cards fly in and out, and it can be extremely confusing, even for somebody who’s familiar with the game. Personally, I may stick with the physical version for now.

Virtual City 2 is sort of a time management game, but instead of simply micro-managing workers to complete tasks, you’re setting up cities. Much of the game is about delivering things: raw materials and goods, people, and waste. Each city starts with some different existing buildings and vehicles and you’re given a list of objectives to complete. Build the necessary facilities, route the vehicles to pick up and deliver the right items to the right places, and do it all in the least amount of time.

Delivering goods and people earns you income, which you spend to build more buildings or expand your fleet of vehicles. Building houses increases the population, adding recreation like theaters and fitness centers increases happiness, and upgrading your buses and facilities improves your environmental score. Depending on the objectives, you’ll be managing various attributes of your cities.

The game can be tough, but I’ve enjoyed it. One thing I wish they had: zoom out. On the larger cities, it’s a pain to pan back and forth to see what buildings already exist and where vehicles are running. It would be nice to get a bird’s-eye view of things.

Sinister City is billed as a “first person hidden object” game, but that’s something of a misnomer. Most hidden object games have things from your perspective during the object-finding part. I think it’s actually more of a third-person game, because you see yourself on the screen instead. At any rate, you’re John, walking around Sinister City trying to find your bride Nina.

Turns out she’s been captured by her dad, who’s a vampire and has his own, ahem, sinister plans. But with some ingenuity, maybe you can convince this not-very-scary vampire to let Nina go. Along the way you’ll look for objects, solve puzzles, and try to figure out what really motivates the quirky inhabitants of Sinister City.

I did like some of the hidden object aspects of this one, but the story is pretty hokey — sometimes intentionally, sometimes not. The combination of third-person adventure and hidden object game isn’t entirely necessary, but maybe that’s me. I don’t necessarily need a convincing reason for finding things; I prefer games where there are just a whole lot of objects on one screen, rather than those where you have to wander around a lot, finding one or two items per location and then coming back later for others.

From the publishers of Cut the Rope comes another clever puzzle game: Follow the Rabbit. Okay, the premise is a little weird. A little red cube-shaped guy sees a cube-shaped rabbit jump down the rabbit hole (leaving a trail of coins behind), and wants to follow it. So you try to collect the coins and reach the door, following the rabbit.

The trick here is that you can slide left and right, or you can jump up — but no moving while jumping. You’ll encounter enemies, balloons, stones to push, cannons, and more. In some levels there are clones: both of the red guys move at the same time, so you’ll have to use some fancy footwork to get them both to their respective doors. One of my favorite levels is “Gravi-Tea,” in which tilting the iPad also shifts gravity, adding another dimension to the puzzle-solving.

They’re not too hard — I played through the first five worlds in maybe an hour and a half — but they are pretty entertaining, and may be a bit more of a challenge for younger players.

Le Havre (The Harbor) is a highly-rated worker-placement game from Uwe Rosenberg, who also designed Agricola and At the Gates of Loyang. You start with a few resources and a worker, and on your turn you can either take resources from the harbor or send your worker to a building to take actions. Actions can include converting resources (turning fish into smoked fish, for instance, or clay into bricks), building new buildings, and so on. You’ll need to keep everyone fed, but you’re also going for wealth through buildings, resources, and cold hard cash.

The app version captures the look of the game pretty well, but it can be hard to play. I think the biggest difficulty is simply that Le Havre is a game that takes a tremendous amount of table space to play. You have a board with lots of resources and a turn tracker, plus piles of buildings that become available, and each player also starts to accumulate buildings, most of which can be accessed by any other player. It’s a feat to cram all this onto a single screen, and it may be that the iPad simply doesn’t have enough real estate for the sprawl.

Each player’s cards are in a stack, so you just see names and some tiny icons until you tap to expand them — but then you can’t see any other player’s buildings. There’s also the weird design choice to have the active player always in the center of the screen and the others rotating around: when you play a multiplayer game, things keep shifting and it’s tough to track what everyone is doing.

This is another board game app that may be better appreciated in physical form, or at least learned in its physical form before you move to the app. I’m not sure how easily I’d be able to pick it up from the app itself.

Bubble Witch Saga is a bubble shooter game that’s also on Facebook, and it kind of shows. The whole thing seems to be about ways to get your money. I’ll admit: I like bubble shooters. I played Snood for hours on end a while back, and I still like to play variations from time to time. Bubble Witch‘s tweak is that there are spiders that drop down when you play well, and the bubbles that fall become part of a pachinko-like game, where you score more points for directing balls into the center cauldron. My complaint about the game is that you unlock upgrades which must then be purchased with real money — there’s no way to earn in-game cash to buy them — and some of them are as much as twelve bucks. This is one bubble shooter that I won’t be playing much more.

If you like tactical combat games, this one is an interesting one to check out. Great Big War Game can be played either single player in a campaign mode or skirmish, or two players with pass-and-play or online. You take charge of an army, deploying units and vehicles onto the field, and then moving and shooting with them. Each unit has different abilities: scouts can move fast and see far, but have no attack and very weak defense; snipers can shoot farther than other troops; grenadiers can lob grenades over walls.

The game also includes “fog of war,” preventing you from seeing areas where you don’t have troops or control facilities. When your enemy is moving, you’ll just see and hear some little sound effects moving around in the cloud, but you won’t know exactly what’s coming or how many troops are around the bend.

There is one weird thing about that, though: the game has a limited “undo” feature, allowing you to pull back your last move if you haven’t done any other actions yet. That means that you can move a scout to check out the enemy and then undo the move, then go somewhere else.

The campaign mode is pretty fun, with different objectives that make it more interesting than just “eliminate the enemy.” Skirmish mode is more just simple elimination. As you play, you’ll gain access to better troops and vehicles. The cartoony appearance is fun, with little goofy catchphrases as you deploy and move and attack.

Biobots is an educational game, set in the Underwater Robot Zoo. There’s an accident, and you need to get help — thankfully, the lab has been working on various robots based on marine animals. It’s your job to put together a robot that can navigate the dangerous waters. You get to pick the size of the hull, the type of breathing apparatus (gills vs. lungs), the type of fuel it can process, and defensive mechanisms like camoflauge or ink. The size of the hull determines how much you can add to your robot: the smaller hull moves more quickly and can navigate through coral reefs and kelp; but the larger hull which requires more energy protects you from many predators. I particularly like the diagrams of the robot animals, with facts about the real animals that the robots are based on. The robot platypus may be my favorite.

Once you’ve built your robot, you get to play the navigator portion, and this is unfortunately a little less exciting. It feels less like a cool robot traveling through waters and more like watching a diagram with rudimentary animation. And it’s hard. But overall I think the app is a good idea. It was developed with support from the Office of Naval Research, and has good potential for getting kids interested in both marine life and robotics.

Disclosure: GeekDad received review codes for the paid apps in this column.

It’s time for another Core Dump! In this one, a fascinating programming puzzle game, a couple of knock-offs (which are nonetheless addictive), and a couple of tabletop games turned into apps. Let’s get to it!

Cargo-Bot is a fascinating puzzle app based on programming. You have a robotic arm, some crates, and several spots where you can stack crates. Each level has a particular goal state. Get your crates to match the goal, and you pass the level. Simple, right?

Well, I’ve spent a lot more time lately playing iPad games than writing about them, so I’ll catch you up on several that have been keeping me busy (though I have to admit that Carcassonne and Hero Academy are probably my most commonly-played apps at the moment). For this Core Dump, I’m going to be brief: just the basic gist of the game and my overall impression, so you can get done reading and get busy playing! (Note: all the apps are universal, for iPhone and iPad, except where noted.)

Cuboid: Get the block to the portal.

I know I’ve played Cuboid online before, although a quick search is mostly turning up knock-off Flash games. Basically you have a 1×2 block which you move by flipping it either end-over-end or rolling along its longer axis. The goal is to drop the cuboid down through the square portal — which means you have to maneuver it so that it tips up straight through the hole. Later levels include switches that activate bridges, teleporters that split the block into two cubes, and lots of fiendishly-designed puzzles. You can grab the app for free, or pay $1.99 for the ad-free version.

My biggest weakness (I say as if I were in a job interview) is that I get hooked on things and forget to go to sleep. Most often that’s because I’m reading a book or playing a game of some sort — particularly on my iPad, if I’m not keeping an eye on the clock. Lately, I’ll admit that the most time has been spent playing DrawSomething (see Core Dump: Draw the Line) but there are a few other apps that have kept me up past my bedtime. It’s a mixed bunch: some RPG-type adventure games, some puzzle games, and a few other odds and ends. Here then, some apps to while away those hours you don’t actually have to spare.